Samson Strikes Down the Philistines

15 Now it happened that after a while, in the time of the wheat harvest, Samson visited his wife ^(A)with a young goat and said, “I will go in to my wife in her room.” But her father did not let him enter. ² And her father said, “I really thought that you hated her intensely; so I ^(B)gave her to your companion. Is not her younger sister better than she? Please let her be yours ^[a]instead.” ³ Samson then said to them, “This time I shall be innocent in regard to the Philistines when I do them harm.” ⁴ So Samson went and caught 300 foxes and took torches and turned the foxes tail to tail and put one torch in the middle between two tails. ⁵ Then he set fire to the torches and sent ^[b]the foxes into the standing grain of the Philistines. So he caused both the shocks and the standing grain, along with the vineyards and groves, to burn. ⁶ Then the Philistines said, “Who did this?” And they said, “Samson, the son-in-law of the Timnite, because ^[c]he took his wife and gave her to his companion.” So the Philistines came up and ^(C)burned her and her father with fire. ⁷ Then Samson said to them, “If you act like this, then I will surely take revenge on you, but after that I will cease.” ⁸ And he struck them ^[d]ruthlessly with a great slaughter; and he went down and lived in the cleft of the rock of Etam.